Four Times Olive Touches Ned & One Time He Touches Her
by Quicksilvermad
Summary: She's his first friend in Papen County. It takes him a long time to sort out how he feels about her, but Olive is nothing if not patient.


**Disclaimer:** Fuller owns it.

* * *

_**1. Hand**_

It starts out simply. Ned gets a call from Emerson Cod and needs someone to watch over Digby for a while. He recently helped his new neighbor move in (she's so tiny and he's so not and it worked out well when she needed help moving large furniture) and noticed that she was an animal lover. She mentioned something about a horse when she first walked into The Pie Hole. Perhaps she could do him this one favor.

It's early when he carefully attaches Digby's leash and walks the few feet to the door to apartment number 44. He knocks quietly and Digby sits by his heel as they wait for the petite woman to answer.

Olive Snook does so wearing a thigh length silk robe tied tightly around her waist and a sleeping mask on her forehead. Her blonde hair is a wreck, but she doesn't seem to care once she sees who is at her doorstep.

"Well, good morning, tall, dark, and helpful. What can I do for you?"

He's momentarily taken aback by the utter cheerfulness of her smile this early in the morning, but Ned simply offers up a sheepish smile and holds up Digby's leash. "I was hoping you could do me a favor. I have an errand to run later today, slightly out of town, so I was wondering if you wouldn't mind looking after him for a while? I usually let him hang out with me in The Pie Hole, but this might end up taking a long time and I don't like leaving him alone," he ends his ramble with crooked lips and a raised eyebrow.

Olive looks down at the Retriever seated so obediently at his master's feet, smiles again, and takes the leash from Ned's hand. "I'd love to watch him. It's only fair since you helped move my bed," she says with a wink.

Ned watches as Digby happily joins Olive in the doorway and leans into her eager hands for some world class petting. The dog hasn't had this sort of affection in a while and Ned feels his throat close up with a snag of emotion. Olive immediately wins Digby's heart with a loud kiss on the top of his furry head. He trots into her living room with his leash trailing behind him and claims her couch as his new napping space. Ned winces at the overly familiar action, but Olive just waves it off and reaches out to tap the back of Ned's hand.

"Oh, he's fine. D'you want me to take him for a walk, too? I can do that."

Ned hesitates, feeling that he is asking too much of a stranger. "If you don't mind," he says at last.

Olive Snook shrugs and glances back at Digby. "Anything for a neighbor," she says.

Her positive attitude and jaunty "have a good day" fuels Ned through his morning baking routines and his trip to the coroner's office with Emerson.

His day is, indeed, a good one.

* * *

_**2. Shoulder**_

He's up to his eyes in customer orders when the bell above the door chimes and Olive Snook comes waltzing in with Digby at her side. She takes in the faces of impatient customers seated in booths and stands on the tips of her toes to try and see into the kitchen. Her neighbor is busy pulling pies from his oven.

In a whirl of apron strings and long limbs, Ned the Pie Maker fills one table's order and immediately strides back behind the counter to cut slices of a lattice crust apple pie for the next table over.

In all of this, Olive notices that Ned has no one to wait on tables.

Digby lies down on the linoleum floor at her feet, and Olive perches on one of the barstools to wait for Ned to find a moment's pause. After watching him make several more rushed trips between the kitchen and the dining area, Olive decides that enough is enough.

She ends up grabbing a coffee carafe and fills cups from table to table. She smiles, makes small talk, collects empty plates, and feels the void she'd been experiencing since the death of her horse begin to fill.

The day wears on. Customers peter out and Ned emerges from the kitchen looking frazzled and, above all, grateful.

"Olive, you didn't have to do that," he says.

She shrugs and wipes the countertop down with a rag she found. "You needed the help," she rationalizes.

"But you're already helping me. With Digby."

Olive smirks. "Where's it written that you can only do one good deed at a time? And how come you don't already have a waitress around here?"

Again with the crooked smile and raised eyebrow. "Poor advertising?"

Olive crosses her arms. "Well, consider this kismet. You need a waitress and I need a real job. Care for an interview?"

The smile moves across Ned's face to include both cheeks in on the action, and Olive Snook is smitten by him. "I think you just had it. No one got up and left before paying this time around."

"Yay!" Olive shakes the rag like a pom-pom and hops on her aching feet. Digby, disturbed from his nap by her outburst, lets out an annoyed chuff. They both shoot him amused glances and return to cleaning up the shop. Uneasy in the silence, Olive breaks it to ask Ned what's been on her mind since she found out about The Pie Hole.

"So, what got you so interested in baking pies?"

He hesitates and absently scrubs the surface of his work station in the kitchen. "My… Mom. She baked pies all the time. Pies remind me of home and I thought: 'why not share that feeling with everyone.' So, here I am."

Olive smiles sweetly and reaches up to pat Ned on the shoulder. "That's lovely, Ned."

His smile is shy. He wasn't expecting her to touch him. He can feel just how small her hand is. "Thanks, Olive. And thanks for coming in here today."

Olive gives his shoulder one last squeeze and tosses her hair. "No problemo, boss."

The next morning, Ned finds her waiting in front of The Pie Hole. She's wearing a bright green dress and a hair clip with a plastic daisy on it. She waves at him and watches as he unlocks the front door. Inside, they split up. Ned retreats to the kitchen to start baking, and Olive returns the chairs to the floor.

It's the start of a new routine.

* * *

_**3. Side**_

The key to the front door of The Pie Hole is warm in Olive's hand. Ned stands in front of her with his hands jammed in his pockets and his shoulders hunched. He's leaning slightly to make himself shorter, but Olive cranes her neck to see his face regardless.

She has been working as a waitress for two weeks now, and Ned is trusting her with a copy of his key.

Not just that. After he hands her the key, he directs her to the kitchen. "Do you cook?" he asks.

"Absolutely!" says Olive. "I make a mean mac and cheese from scratch." She picks up a rolling pin and weighs it in her palm.

Ned skirts around the prep table and gestures at the ingredients displayed. "Do you know how to make pie?"

Her eyes light up. "Sure do. Are you asking for more help?"

Ned purses his lips and shoves his hands back into his pockets. "I've recently come across a way to… Well, earn some extra income to pay the bills here. And you," he adds the last quickly. "But it requires my time away from The Pie Hole and I can't afford to close up so…"

Olive blinks up at him and fiddles with the rolling pin in her hands. "So this is a promotion?"

Ned hesitates and then smiles sheepishly. "Think of it as going from 'waitress' to 'pie girl.' Or something like that. Anyway," he shakes his head and gathers up a bowl of plums, "The pie of the day is three plum. Let's see what you can do."

Together, they roll out dough and cut fruit. Olive eagerly watches Ned's technique and they slide their pies into the oven at the same time. She asks him about his plan to earn more money on the side and Ned tells her a half-truth about meeting Emerson Cod, the private investigator.

"You're helping a private investigator? That's so amazing! I bet you're great. You're so detail-oriented," she says.

"You really think so? I'm actually… Still kinda nervous about it every time he calls."

Olive reaches over and unexpectedly wraps one arm around Ned's back to squeeze him in a side hug. The contact is quick and she's back to her spot against the counter in a blink. Ned barely has time to process it. He crosses his arms uncomfortably and focuses on the oven, not wanting to think about how Olive's touch felt.

"You'll do great," Olive repeats. She sounds so sure of her statement that Ned glances at her and wonders where her certainty comes from. He feels an almost unfamiliar rush of kinship with Olive Snook and realizes that she's his friend. He's told her about some of his issues—about his dislike of Halloween and his "allergy" to Digby—and she shared some of hers. A warm sensation grows in his chest as he thinks about about how open she is with him.

"Olive?"

She looks up at him. "Yeah, Ned?"

"Thanks."

Olive smiles brightly and nudges him in the ribs with her shoulder. "Anytime."

* * *

_**4. Neck**_

Olive wears short skirts. Often. It's something that Ned tries not to take notice of, but he gets distracted by the shape of her calves nonetheless. Digby often follows her around the shop and blocks Ned's view—which snaps the Pie Maker out of leering (he is convinced that it's leering and feels ashamed about it). She is his friend, and has been for two years now. They have a shorthand in the kitchen. They have inside jokes.

So, yes, he feels slightly ashamed of the random waves of attraction he's blindsided by.

It's a beautiful summer day, and Ned's eyes are drawn to Olive in her orange "uniform." He's leaning his elbows against the pie carousel that separates the kitchen from the bar top, taking a break from prepping pies for the oven to listen to the noise of the people eating in his diner.

There is an elderly couple seated in one of the booths. They both ordered the special (Olive's peach cobbler with cinnamon ice cream on the side) and are discussing their grandson's graduation from college. The grandmother wants to take the boy on a trip to Europe for his graduation present. The grandfather wants to pay off all the boy's student loans. Ned thinks both ideas are lovely gestures.

"You need a haircut."

Ned glances down at the blonde standing in front of him and raises an eyebrow at her. "Huh?"

Olive stands on the tips of her toes and runs her finger along the back of his neck, ruffling Ned's hair. "I said that you needed a haircut. You're gettin' a little shaggy there, Ned."

Ned gives Olive a sidelong look and raises his other eyebrow as well.

Olive shrugs and moves her hand away from Ned's neck. "Or… Not. Up to you."

He lets out a sigh and nods at the table with the grandparents. "Think they're going to come to a consensus while they're eating here?"

"Table six?" Olive glances at the table in question and perks up. "Oh! I've got my money on grandma. Wouldn't that be amazing? Going on a trip to Europe for graduation?"

Ned leans back up and wipes his hands on his apron. "Eh, I don't know. Paying off student loans seems more… Practical."

"Where is your sense of adventure, Ned?" Olive asks, aghast.

Ned just purses his lips and looks down at his hands. "It's in my other pants."

Olive just scoffs and shakes her head. "Lame," she decides.

"Eh," Ned returns to the kitchen and grabs his rolling pin on the way. "I've gone this long without it."

His words are flippant, and Olive feels stung for some inexplicable reason.

So, Ned returns to his pies and Olive returns to her customers.

As the elderly couple gets ready to pay their bill and leave, she asks if they made a decision on their graduation gift.

Their grandson is going on a tour of Europe in three months.

Ned catches himself staring at Olive's calves three more times during the rest of the day.

* * *

_**5. Backside**_

The Pie Hole is not open yet and the floor is wet. Why is the floor wet? Ned frowns and stops rolling out dough. The water is up to the rivet holes in his Chuck Taylors, dampening his socks.

He lifts one foot and stares at his soaking shoe. "What the…?"

A whooshing sound hits the back door. Water comes streaming in through the cracks, and Ned is on the move. He grabs two of his triple berry pies and runs, splashing past the pie carousel. The room floods up to his shins and there is Olive, staring at him in confusion with a can of coffee in one hand and a scoop in the other.

"Is that—"

She doesn't get to finish her question. Ned has bent at the waist and wraps one arm around her backside to sling her into a fireman's carry over his shoulder. He has two pies in his left hand and Olive's thighs in his right with water up to his knees.

"Ned!"

He briefly lets go of Olive's legs and forces the front door open against the current. A fish swims past Ned's legs and lands on the sidewalk with a splat. With the petite woman still cradled over his shoulder, Ned runs to the edge of the sidewalk and watches as The Pie Hole fills up to its round windows with water.

An elbow digs into Ned's back, and he's suddenly aware of the placement of his right hand—squarely on Olive's backside.

"Oh!" he starts and leans down to let her off his shoulder. Olive straightens her dress and fixes her hair, her face flushed red. "Olive, I'm sorry—I just grabbed all I could and ran."

He thinks about this statement for a second and turns bright red.

"I mean… I…"

She clears her throat and looks from the flooded Pie Hole to Ned. He's crumpled in on himself with his shoulders hunched and is balancing two stacked pies in his left hand. There's a trout gasping on the sidewalk beside him, and Olive is left wondering what just happened.

"Did the river back up, or something?" she asks.

"Looks like it. I'm just glad that I got flood insurance before something like this happened," says Ned. He's still blushing.

"Well, I'm glad you're so darn fast!" Olive praises and pats him in the center of his chest. Ned smiles slightly and shrugs a little. Together, they watch fish swim inside The Pie Hole and try to ignore the fact that neither of them really minded the whole "hand on ass" thing.


End file.
